What If Chess Pieces Were Cryptocurrencies?

Interest in these digital assets has soared like great blooming tulips, and prices have grown even higher. You can't turn on CNBC for more than a few minutes without seeing someone talking excitedly about Bitcoin or Ethereum. The collective market capitalization of all cryptocurrencies has surged over $700 billion, making them together more valuable than all but one public corporation on earth.

Trading these cryptocurrencies takes both luck and skill, a little like chess (except when AlphaZero is playing). There is also a lot of interest in blockchains and cryptocurrencies among chess players, as there seems to be in every intellectual hobby these days.

IM Lawrence Trent was vocally tracking the price of Bitcoin throughout his three-hour Death Match against IM John Bartholomew yesterday, and some of the Chess.com founders were early adopters.

Even GM Hikaru Nakamura sometimes tweets about cryptocurrencies in the news.

Just as pawns are the basis for material points in chess, those in cryptocurrency can always count on one thing: 1 Dogecoin = 1 Dogecoin.

Dogecoin is a humble project that was mostly meant for fun, and not as a serious means of exchange. Nevertheless the very old Doge has recently reached an astounding $1.5 billion in market cap, just like advanced pawns can quickly skyrocket in value on the chessboard. Such wow.

Knight = Ripple

This project recently jumped over Ethereum to become the second-most valuable coin in a move few saw coming, and then jumped back to the number-three spot a few days later. Unexpected jumping around sounds like how my opponents play their knights against me in chess.

A big complaint against Ripple by crypto-critics is that it is "too centralized," but what could be better for a knight than centralization on the chessboard?

Bishop = Raiblocks

A bishop can travel quickly across the board, but only on one color. Raiblocks is perhaps the fastest-transacting cryptocurrency, but it can only do one thing, payments, just like a bishop must stay on its diagonals.

Plus, Raiblocks proponents seem to believe in the new and untested coin with a deeply religious fervor.

Rook = Litecoin

Litecoin has a reputation as a steady, solid coin that's been around for a long time and is straightforward in its goals.

It's not the most exciting coin, but it gets the job done and has stood the test of time, just like the "boring" rooks that often stick around to play crucial roles in the endgame.

Queen = Ethereum

Ethereum is a fast and powerful distributed computing platform that could be a game-changer. When thinking of the future of cryptocurrency, you must account for it, just like you have to plan for the powerful queen in any chess game.

The queen can do almost anything on the chessboard, and Ethereum and its smart contracts can do almost anything on the blockchain.

King = Bitcoin

Bitcoin started it all, and is still the most important cryptocurrency by market cap and trading volume. The king, of course, is unquestionably the most important piece on the chessboard.

The king is the most valuable chess piece, but its movements are a little slow compared to the other pieces. Bitcoin's high value and currently slow transactions match the king perfectly.

How do you think crypocurrencies compare to chess pieces? Let us know in the comment section.

Disclaimer: This article was solely written for fun. Please do not take anything I have ever said in my life as investment advice, chess advice, or any kind of advice.